To her great satisfaction Queen Victoria was proclaimed Empress of India in 1876 and thereafter imported an Indian flavour to her court. There was a Durbar Room at Osborne, and, after the death of John Brown, she employed as her personal attendant Abdul Karim from Agra. His airs made him, like Brown before him, most unpopular in court circles, but the Queen defended him with absolute tenacity and he remained in her service until her death. In Agra, Karim had been a clerk or Munshi and in 1889 he was created Queen's Munshi, relieving him of such menial duties as waiting at table. He rapidly graduated, as Prince Albert had done, from blotting the Queen's letters to helping in their composition; he also gave his mistress lessons in Hindustani. In this photograph Karim stand in attendance as the Queen works on her boxes in her garden-tent at Frogmore House in Windsor.

Current affairs

Keir Hardie is among the group who formalise the Independent Labour Party, and is elected chairman and party leader at the opening conference. Gladstone continues with his campaign for home rule in Ireland, introducing the Second Home Rule Bill, which is passed by the Commons but vetoed by the Lords.

Art and science

Art Nouveau becomes a fully established movement in European art and design, after emerging in different countries and across different disciplines at the start of the decade. Key figures include the illustrator Aubrey Beardsley, architects Victor Horta and Paul Hankar, and the designer Alphonse Mucha. Art Nouveau is characterised by the 'whiplash' line, a decorative line which represents graphically the desire to break free from traditional aesthetic constraints.

International

Gandhi's ejection from a South African train carriage on account of his race is the catalyst for his non-violent activism in leading the struggle for Indian independence from British rule. New Zealand becomes the first self-governing country to grant women the vote. The Chicago World's Fair is visited by more than 200 million people, with Nikola Tesla and George Westinghouse introducing electrical power to illuminate the fair.

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